Eating mindfully, eating consciously

I want to share some thoughts about diet and eating. Of course, those of us in the Work have often had the task of "eating consciously", and for many this is now the way that all food is consumed, at least, as far as we're able to maintain our more conscious state during a meal, that is. And that state, of course, increases with practice.

But recently there have been a number of books on "mindful eating". Is this the same as "conscious eating"? If not, how does it differ?

I think there's a real difference, and that the two practices are based on different understandings of what it means to eat with greater awareness.

For the mindfulness practitioners, the process of being more "mindful", more aware, is something that begins with a form of meditation and can gradually be extended to cover more areas of daily life. So far, this sounds a lot like the Work, and there's no contradiction between the two.  But the difference, in practice, seems to be one of depth. In the Work, we want to become more than just "mindful"; we want to deepen and extend our consciousness so that our whole life becomes a way of reaching a higher level of Being.

Mindfulness itself is a good thing. It's like the beginning stages of self-observation, and if it helps people to become more awake and less mechanical, that can only be helpful to the individual and to the collective.

But in the Work, we wish to go further.

Of all the books I've read on mindful eating, many seem to describe a process of tuning in to our intellectual, emotional and sensual reactions to food, and the vast majority then go on to recommend a mostly vegetarian or vegan diet. This, supposedly, is the result of considering what and how we eat.

I found in my own experience that this approach worked for me for a while.

Let me digress a little and share my diet journey with you. I began eating macrobiotically during the 1970s, studied with Michio Kushi and had cookery lessons with his wife, Aveline. They recommended a vegetarian - in effect, a vegan - diet, supplemented with a little fish.

On the other hand, when I was initiated into the Sufis, during the same period, my teacher, Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan, specifically told me not to promise to become a vegetarian. All the other mureeds undertook this pledge at their ceremony, but Pir Vilayat told me that I would need to eat meat at times, even though I wouldn't like it.

As a determined macrobiotic eater, however, I chose to ignore this piece of advice. My reasoning was as follows: lambs and calves and chickens are very sweet and lovable creatures; I enjoyed watching them and cuddling them when I had the chance; therefore, since I liked them so much, I had no business eating them.

I calculated my needs for protein, vitamins, minerals and other nutrients so that I could be pretty sure I was getting the right diet for my individual body, and occasionally included fish so that I would have the fish oils that I didn't think my body could make.

I ignored the fact that over the years I was getting less healthy, not more so, and that IBS had become a constant, unpleasant state. I was always tired, but put that down to my diabetes and hypothyroid (which in itself might have been precipitated by the large amounts of soyfoods I was putting away on my supposedly healthy macrobiotic diet).

But one day my husband had to have a blood test, and it turned out he was anemic. The doctors said it would be advisable for him to eat red meat, as he would assimilate the iron better than from plants or from a supplement, so I dutifully cooked him shepherds pie, spag bol, roast chicken and chili until his test results improved.

I usually cooked separate meals for us both so that I didn't have to eat meat myself. I didn't enjoy cooking his dishes, but did so with love and awareness that the health of a human being, especially one so dear to me, was more important by far than the life or death of an animal, however cute the latter might be.

After a particularly tiring day, however, I lacked the energy to cook two different main courses, so I took the plunge and shared his shepherd's pie. And it was a revelation! Within half an hour, I felt a distinct sensation of warmth and relaxation, a sort of "groundedness", permeating my body. An hour later, and my IBS stopped. My tiredness lifted, and I felt a strong sense of wellbeing, so much so that I slept better that night than I had done for years.

Clearly, my instinctive/moving centre was trying to tell me something, the same message that Pir Vilayat had given me all those years ago: I was an omnivore, and I needed meat.

Checking my DNA, which I'd had tested at 23andme, I saw that most of my ancestors came from very cold countries in northern Europe and Russia, where vegetarianism would have meant starvation. I was programmed to eat animal protein, whether I liked that fact or not.

And then I realized that I'd been using the wrong centres with which to select and enjoy my food. I'd left out the most important one of all - that of my own body, which had been trying to tell me it needed different food, but which I'd overridden by insisting on my attachment to vegetarian and vegan food and the accompanying feelings of virtue and "purity" it brought.

I'd been using my emotional centre when I should have been aware of my instinctive/moving centre. Instead of taking notice of the latter, I'd also brought in the intellectual to calculate my nutritional needs - not in itself a problem, but insufficient to guarantee that I was really getting what I needed.

And this, I think, is what much "mindful eating" advice does: focuses on the emotional and intellectual centres to the detriment of the body's own needs. Of course, there are exceptions, and for many people, especially those whose ancestors come from warmer countries, vegetarian/vegan regimes may be beneficial. But for a northern European like me, they couldn't fill the bill.

So now, for me, eating consciously means being aware of my physical needs as well as my emotional reactions to food, and my intellectual awareness of various nutrients. If I listen to my body, all is well. If I don't, I will slide back into that constantly tired, depleted state. It's no use my being sentimentally aware of the adorableness of baby lambs - I'm a three-brained being, and my needs must take priority.

I'm sorry if I've shocked anyone. I know people become very attached to their own dietary regimes, because I was myself until my road-to-Damascus moment.

But Gurdjieff tells us that we must strive to have in our presence everything "really necessary" for our planetary existence, and for many of us, that includes meat. He was certainly no vegetarian, far less a vegan. He deplored faddiness and sentimentality over food. He did hint that in the right circumstances a vegetarian diet could be beneficial, but he clearly didn't consider that those conditions existed for most people, and certainly not for himself or his students.

We must feed all of our centres when we take in this first being food, and we must be aware through experience and constant awareness just what it is that we need.

Now, my emotional centre no longer interferes with its annoyingly sentimental I's, but instead I'm full of gratitude that I can eat exactly what I need. Grateful that I can afford to buy it, that I'm fit enough to cook it, and that I can share it with those I love. Grateful to everyone whose efforts have brought it to my table - the farmers, the butchers, the shopworkers - and for the fact that I can also afford to insist on free range, healthy meat.

Animal welfare is extremely important, whether we're vegetarian or omnivore. And so I also extend gratitude to the animals whose lives have been taken so that I can enjoy better health and wellbeing. In our house, we always say grace before meals, and this, for me, is the epitome of eating consciously.

And one final thought - I believe that no one diet fits everyone, all the time. So, if you discover the way of eating that best suits you, be aware too that your needs may change, and that by remaining vigilant to your body's reactions you can stay as healthy as possible.